Shocking mystery deepens as third newborn baby from same parents is found abandoned in seven years
Niamh Shackleton
Featured Image Credit: MET Police
A seven-year mystery continues as another child was discovered abandoned in London.
In 2017, a baby boy was left in a park in London, UK, with the same thing happening two years later with a baby girl.
The two children (known as Baby Harry and Baby Roman) we later discovered to have come from the same parents, but they're yet to be tracked down.
And now, a third child has been identified and found to be the sibling of the two previously abandoned babies.
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Named Baby Elsa, the infant was discovered in January 2024 in a shopping bag in Newham when she was less than an hour old.
She was found by a member of the public who had been walking their dog in the area.
DNA testing later confirmed that Baby Elsa is the full sibling of Baby Harry and Baby Roman and now Metropolitan Police are appealing for help in identifying their parents.
All three children are black.
After trawling through hours of CCTV, police have asked for help in identifying a woman seen wearing a large dark coat with a light coloured scarf or hood around her neck and had a rucksack on her back, shortly before Elsa was found, as per a police press release.
Speaking on the matter, Detective Inspector Jamie Humm from the North East Command Unit said they've so far had no success in locating the parents in question.
"We understand the significant public interest that will come following the lifting of restrictions that allow this information to be reported," he said.
"It is significant news and our work has focused on trying to locate the mother and provide support to her."
DI Humm went on: "We have worked 24/7 in each of these three cases to identify the parents, so far without success.
"We have also had to be mindful of the sensitivities that exist now all of the children are being cared for. Their welfare, including their privacy, is paramount."
While the babies' identities would usually be kept private in accordance with UK media laws, Judge Carol Atkinson recently lifted reporting restrictions because the ordeal is of 'great public interest' and may assist the police in their ongoing inquiries.
"There is a clear public interest in reporting this story," she said, Metro Online reports.
"The abandonment of a baby in this country is a very, very unusual event and there are years where there are no children abandoned, and because of that it is the story of the abandoning of a child that is of public interest."